residence in the
family mansion.

Inheriting his father's love of literature, and deriving from his mother
a taste for elegant accomplishments, Alexander Boswell diligently
applied himself to the cultivation of his mind, by an examination of the
stores of the famous "Auchinleck Library." From his youth he had been
ardent in his admiration of Burns, and had written verses for the
amusement of his friends. A wooer of the lyric Muse, many of his lays
rapidly obtained circulation, and were sung with a gusto not inferior to
that inspired by the songs of the Bard of Coila. In 1803 he published,
without his name, in a thin octavo volume, "Songs, chiefly in the
Scottish Dialect," and subsequently contributed a number of lyrics of
various merit to the Musical Collection of Mr George Thomson, and
Campbell's "Albyn's Anthology." Several other poetical works proceeded
from his pen. In 1803, shortly after the appearance of his songs, he
published a ballad entitled "The Spirit of Tintoc; or, Johnnie Bell and
the Kelpie," with notes, 16 pp. 8vo: Mundell and Son, Edinburgh. This
performance, in which are humorously related the adventures of a drunken
tailor with the brownies and other denizens of the unseen world, on the
summit of Tintoc Hill, was followed in 1810 by another amusing poem,
bearing the title of "Edinburgh, or the Ancient Royalty, a Sketch of
Former Manners, with Notes by Simon Gray." In this poem, the changes
which had occurred in the habits of the citizens of Edinburgh are
pourtrayed in a colloquy between an old farmer and his city friend. In
1811 appeared "Clan-Alpin's Vow, a Fragment," with the author's name
prefixed. This production, founded upon a horrible tragedy connected
with the history of the Clan Macgregor, proved one of the most popular
of the author's works; it was reprinted in 1817, by Bentley and Son,
London. His future publications may be simply enumerated; they were
generally issued from a printing press which he established in the
mansion of Auchinleck. In 1812 he printed, for private circulation, a
poetical fragment entitled "Sir Albon," intended to burlesque the
peculiar style and rhythm of Sir Walter Scott; in 1815, "The Tyrant's
Fall," a poem on the battle of Waterloo; in 1816, "Skeldon Haughs, or
the Sow is Flitted," a tale in verse founded on an old Ayrshire
tradition; and in the same year another poetical tale, after the manner
of Allan Ramsay's "Monk and Miller's Wife," entitled, "The Woo'-cree